Taking a chance on Obama…for the wolves.

My husband says I am a politician’s worst nightmare. Not because I don’t vote or because I campaign blindly for the opposing party, but because after careful consideration of each candidate, I choose the one I agree with most or the one I think will do the most good in office and vote for them. I don’t care about political parties or any of that other crap, I vote for who I choose and I vote from my heart.

And with the election for president coming up I’d pretty much decided this time I would do something very rare for me and vote Republican. It was a hard decision because I admit, about 95% of the time, the candidates I choose to support are Democrat and after Bush…well, enough said.

So, I was going to grit my teeth and vote for McCain, but after today when I found out who he chose to run with him, all I can say is I’m looking at Obama again. I had originally decided against him because he makes me uncomfortable and I just don’t think he’s the right man for the job, but since McCain chose Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska as his running mate, the choice has been taken out of my hands.

Why? Well, I belong to several environmental groups who send out numerous emails to their members every month to keep us posted on what’s going on. Last month, the Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund sent an email titled, “14 Wolf Pups Executed in Alaska”.

First, the picture:

And in the body of the email, this appalling news:

Here’s what happened: State wildlife agency personnel staked out a known wolf denning site — a practice that is illegal under Alaska law — and, using helicopters, they gunned down 14 adult wolves from the air, part of an effort to boost caribou populations in Southwest Alaska.

When they landed, they found the 14 helpless pups in the nearby dens — just weeks old — and methodically shot each one in the head. 28 wolves gunned down in all.

Now I’m all for boosting the caribou population, but not at the expense of another species. Especially not like this. This senseless killing of animals just turned my stomach and if it doesn’t turn yours, I don’t know what will.

Then, another couple of paragraphs down, you come across this nasty little tidbit:

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has even signed off on a $400,000 state-funded propaganda campaign to justify the state’s barbaric wolf slaughter from the skies.

Yes, that’s right, the woman McCain chose to run with him is, in my eyes, a supporter of cold-blooded mass murder. Doesn’t matter that, as I’m sure some people will say, it was only a bunch of animals. What matters, IMO, is the fact that it should never have happened and they should have done everything possible to find a better, more humane solution. And Governor Palin should have been at the forefront, leading the charge to find that solution. Instead, she sided with the murderers and is even giving them money so they can attempt to justify what they did.

Nope, I’m sorry, but there’s no way I’ll ever vote for someone with that degree of disregard for our environment and its species.

So, unless he does something incredibly stupid over the next couple of months, I’m going to take my chances with Obama. He may not have been my first choice, but hopefully, this kind of mass slaughter of innocent animals bothers him just as much as it does me.